Leaked UK memo says Trump axed Iran deal to spite Obama

A UK newspaper has published more leaked memos revealing a British ambassador's blunt assessments of the Trump administration, including one in which the envoy to Washington claimed President Donald Trump pulled out of the Iran nuclear deal to spite predecessor Barack Obama.

In the May 2018 cable published by the Mail on Sunday, UK Ambassador Kim Darroch called Mr Trump's decision to abandon the international accord "an act of diplomatic vandalism, seemingly for ideological and personality reasons" because the pact "was Obama's deal".

Darroch wrote the memo after then-Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson visited Washington in a failed attempt to persuade the United States not to abandon the 2015 nuclear agreement.

He alleged the White House had no strategy for what would come after its withdrawal and "no sort of plan for reaching out to partners and allies".

The newspaper published new details from confidential diplomatic cables despite a police warning that making the documents public might be a crime.

Scotland Yard is hunting for the perpetrator who leaked confidential diplomatic cables to the Mail. Last week the newspaper published memos from Darroch describing the Trump administration as dysfunctional and inept.

The publication of the ambassador's unguarded views, meant for a small group of ministers and senior officials in London, cost him his job.

Mr Trump responded by calling Darroch "very stupid" and a "pompous fool" in a Twitter fusillade, and the White House cut off contact with the British envoy.

A formal inquiry will take place into the leak of sensitive diplomatic memos detailing the "uniquely dysfunctional" and "inept" White House under Donald Trump, sent by the United Kingdom's ambassador to the United States Kim Darroch. (PA/AAP)